Percy Priest Lake

I love learning about history from people who have lived it. I was recently talking to a friend in her 60’s who has lived in Nashville all her life, and she told me something that surprised me: Percy Priest Lake hasn’t always been there. Maybe this is something that everybody else knew, but I didn’t. It is a man-made lake that grew out of the Stone’s River when the Percy Priest Dam was built between 1963 and 1968. I did a little research of my own and found out the lake covers 14,200 acres in Davidson, Wilson and Rutherford Counties.

Many families had to give up their homes and land so it could be created. Roads that used to go from one place to another were completely covered. I had noticed that Old Hickory Blvd. in Hermitage dead-ends right into the lake. (It would be much easier for me to visit my brother or my mom if it wasn’t there.) There was once a town called Old Jefferson that is now completely submerged. There were a number of cemeteries in the area that had to be moved before the lake was made.

So what was the point? Apparently there had been a lot of flooding in the area anyway, so they decided to put it to good use. The dam helps generate electricity used by local residents. The lake also provides for boating, swimming, fishing, beaches and other water activities.

J. Percy Priest, for whom it is named, was a Tennesseean who served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1940-1956. He really had nothing to do with the creation of the lake, but the name was chosen in his honor shortly after he died.

Thanks, Ms. Barbara, for your info!

This picture is from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' Digital Visual Library.